Light Up the Sky
by lil jake
Summary: Movieverse. Tony/Pepper. It's going to be a long night...
1. Chapter 1

It's late.

Pepper's ginger-rimmed eyelids are heavy as she sorts through the unceasing stream of email in Tony's inbox. Press conference, click. Fan-mail, click. More fan-mail. Click, click, click. She watches with triumph as she drags a slew of highlighted messages into one folder. How efficient—it gets rid of 12 emails at once, and immediately 13 appear to replace them.

She is sitting straight-backed on the cream couch, one long leg tucked under the other. Her black stilettos were kicked off hours ago, but she doubts Tony has noticed. She looks over at him, briefly; he is slouched across the sofa, several feet away, one jean-clad leg resting on the coffee table. He holds the remote straight out, at eye-level, clicking through the 3,000 digital satellite channels, checking sports scores and reactions to his now week-old news. There is still plenty, and he pauses on a local Malibu news station with a particularly attractive blonde twenty-something talking about the possible futures of Stark Industries. The arc-reactor glows softly through his black wife-beater.

Pepper returns to her work.

"Honey Phelps," Tony mutters, "Do you think that's her real name?"

"Huh?" Pepper looks up, shaking her bangs out of her blue eyes, "I…I don't know, Mr. Stark."

"Honey's kind of ridiculous."

"So is 'Pepper'," Pepper replies absently, refusing to be swept up in Tony's 16-year-old banter.

"But that's a nickname. I bet 'Honey' is a nickname." Tony sounds decided, so Pepper agrees.

"Sure."

"Pepper…" Tony's voice has a slight whine to it, "What are you doing at…Jarvis!"

"The time is 2:26 AM," Jarvis's soothing voice interjects.

Pepper rolls her eyes without looking up, "There's a clock on the wall, Mr. Stark. Come to think of it, there's also one on the TV. Oh, and one on your wrist. It's called a watch."

She can feel Tony scooting closer to her on the couch, so she keeps her eyes trained on the laptop screen. She opens a 'Compose Message' window and scrolls through her address list for Colonel Rhodes's e-mail. Tony's tousled brown hair enters the corner of her vision.

"What are you doing over here, Pepper?"

She sighs, and looks up. "I'm writing an email to Colonel Rhodes about your meeting with him tomorrow."

"Oh? What are you saying?"

"I'm just confirming." Pepper looks straight into his brown eyes, "It's at 3 p.m."

"You look tired," Tony observes, "Really tired. Why are you still working?"

"Because there's still work to be done." Pepper dips her head and concentrates on the blurring screen in front of her.

"Screw work," Tony says, and closes her laptop. Pepper's mouth drops open in shock and she brings her gaze back up to his.

He grins—disarmingly, she notices—"You didn't save that email, did you? Well, Rhodey'll get the idea when I show up at 3."

Pepper brings both hands up to her temples and begins to rub in counter-clockwise circular motions. She closes her eyes and breathes through her nose. "There were other things on there that I didn't save, Mr. Stark."

"Do it tomorrow."

Pepper continues to breathe.

"Pepper, don't be that way. _I'll _do it tomorrow."

Pepper snorts. "Like you have any idea how to organize your personal life."

"I know my social security number, now. Pepper. Come on, Pepper." Tony grasps both of her wrists and lifts her hands away from her face.

She opens her eyes to find his sardonic brown ones inches from her own. There is a pregnant pause, and she is suddenly very aware of his big hands curled around her slender wrists, of the heat radiating off his body as he leans into her, of the way his brown eyes are slowly deepening in color. Of how the fluorescent-blue of the arc-reactor is pulsating softly in his chest.

She shakes her head, clearing the cobwebs and pulls her wrists from his grasp. "I guess I should go home, then."

Her hands are shaky as she pushes the black notebook computer into her practical briefcase, and she avoids looking at him by straightening the already-neat row of pens inside. "I'll uh, I'll see you tomorrow."

She closes the briefcase with a snap, and leans down to slip her heels back on. She fastens the ankle-strap around her left ankle and raises up, only to find herself centimeters from Tony Stark's infamous smirk. He looks like he is about to say something, but she beats him to it.

"Good evening, Mr. Stark."

He opens his mouth to return the salutation, but instead, he kisses her.

It only takes centimeters to close the gap between them and he feels her startled sigh as he presses his lips against hers. Her briefcase thuds to the plush carpeting as he reaches one arm around her size-2 waist and yanks her closer to him.

She doesn't know what to do with her hands, so she allows one to tentatively curl around the back of his neck, toying with his already-mussed hair. He wraps both arms around her, dragging her half onto his lap as he slants his mouth across hers, opening the seal of her lips with a quick thrust of his tongue.

He holds her like he can't get enough, and he tastes like expensive scotch and smells like rich cologne. His tongue delves into her mouth, effectively chasing away any doubts or even thoughts that were lingering in her brain, twisting and toying with her own. After what seems like hours, but is really only minutes, he pulls back—slightly.

She gasps for air and he breathes deep, before leaning back in.

She puts one hand on his chest, over his arc-reactor, sees the mellow blue glow through her fingers. Her other hand is still traitorously curling in his thick, disheveled hair.

The two seconds of breath has been enough to clear her head, and she dips lashes low and then up, her blue eyes wide and scared.

"Tony," she whispers.

He nods, his eyes still closed, and moves toward her but she pushes back.

"Tony!"

His eyes fly open at her urgency and he cocks his head. Upon seeing that there is no immediate danger to either him or her person, he pulls her closer.

"Stop." She extracts herself from his arms, and pushes herself, gracefully, off his lap. He looks like a 6-year-old child, or a puppy. She turns away, shakily bending over to pick up her briefcase. She smoothes out her charcoal grey pencil skirt and turns back, "I'll see you tomorrow, Mr. Stark."

She strides, as purposefully as she can, toward the front door of the mansion—wobbling only slightly on her five-inch stilettos.

-

As she exits, Tony lies back on the sofa, and lets out a low groan.

-

Pepper slips between her 1500-count Egyptian cotton sheets—Tony Stark's gift to her for Christmas of 2005—in nothing but white silk panties, and sighs.

-

_It's going to be a long night._


	2. Chapter 2

It's the first time he's overslept in eight years.

He knows this because Jarvis draws the shades at seven a.m., and he is jolted from a hazy dreamworld of soft curves and long legs and sparkling blue eyes and ginger-red hair. He can still see the dark cobalt of her eyes, slightly smudged eyeliner and swollen lips. He wonders what it would be like to wake up next to her, one arm swept over the curve of her hips. He wonders what it would be like to see her wake up, to see her pretty smile in the light of a sunrise, to playfully convince her to stay in bed with him. Then he wonders when was the last time that he hung around to see a woman wake up. He can't decide if it's been longer than when he last overslept.

_Tony,_ her voice swells and then fades in a fuzzy heap as Jarvis recites the weather conditions and stock market numbers. Tony blinks at the panorama that his bedroom overlooks, soft, rolling waves off the coast of Malibu that he never has the time to enjoy because he spends so much time tinkering about in the shop. The sea and sky blend into an endless blue, and his first thought is that Pepper loves boats.

_I should take her sailing,_ he thinks, as he extracts himself from the tangled mass of linens and flops off of his ridiculously large bed. _Pepper would never go sailing with me. Maybe if I hold a gala on my yacht… _He runs one hand through his longish hair and wanders to the bathroom to brush his teeth and, er, take care of some business.

One cold shower and cup of black coffee later, he's back in the shop, putting the final touches on the stealth capacity of his suit.

-

He's leaning in, concentrating on the mass of wires in front of him when she whispers in his ear. "Mr. Stark?"

He jumps, nearly disrupting the cappuccino she has in her hand and laughs, heavily. "Miss Potts?" He glances up at her, his brown eyes dark.

A faint pink tinges the smattering of freckles on the apples of her cheeks, but she shakes her head slightly and smiles. "I need you to sign these, they're for S.H.I.E.L.D., and then I need you to tell me when you want to reschedule that meeting with the Board and how long you think your write-up on—"

Tony smirks at her, and takes the thick sheaf of papers quickly. "Where do I sign?"

"I highlighted it, so here, and here…and here…and here…there…and there…and here…yeah, and there again…"

Tony is nodding to the tune of her voice, not bothering to point out that he can now see perfectly well where she's highlighted.

"And here, and here…and…well, you get the point."

Pepper picks up the papers as he finishes signing the last one and clicks toward the door on her heels. Tony can't help watching her appreciatively as she makes small steps in those ridiculous—but extraordinarily sexy—shoes.

"Hey, Pepper?"

"Yes, Mr. Stark?" She pivots expertly and cocks her head so her bangs fall slightly in her eyes.

"You look tired. Maybe we should take a break this afternoon, go out for a—"

"I look tired?" Pepper's hand flies up to her face, smoothing her fingers across the area under her eye as if trying to remember how she did her make-up this morning.

"No, I meant, why don't we go out this afternoon. On my yacht."

"Oh, I don't think that would be a…good idea."

"Really?"

"Really."

Tony smiles as charmingly as he can, "C'mon, Pepperrrrrr…you work too much."

"That's because I'm working for the both of us."

"Now that's not fair. I've been working on this all morning. Do you wanna see?"

"Oh, no, no Tony, I have to get back upstairs."

He floats his fingers over his keyboard and the suit flickers into black.

Pepper gapes. "What's that?" She clicks back over to him, and peers at the suit. One of her hands gently reaches out to touch it.

"No!"

She recoils, and looks at him.

"No, I mean, it's not ready yet. A couple more hours and I'll be done. Just some rewiring…but don't touch it, you might get electrocuted."

"That's reassuring."

"Anyway, a couple hours and then we can go out?" He puts on his best puppy-dog face and she nearly laughs.

"I'm sorry, Tony, no. Anyway, you have a meeting with Rhodes. He said he has someone he wants you to meet."

"Rhodey! Wow, I forgot about that. Hmm. A lady friend, perhaps?" A self-satisfied smirk spreads over his lips.

Pepper is amazed at how quickly the mind of Tony Stark switches tracks, but at least he's stopped hounding her about inappropriate outings upon which she's not so sure how her excellent self-restraint would work. "I don't think so," she says, traitorously pleased as the smirk drops from his face, "But he didn't say."

With that, she turns and walks away, stepping carefully through the still-broken glass and up the steps.

-

He turns back to the suit and pulls on the wire he had been concentrating on earlier.

**Zzzt****!** He yanks his hand away as it electrocutes him. He glances quickly at the arc reactor in his chest, which is still glowing steadily, and back at the wires in confusion.

"Jarvis, pull up an exploded view of this for me."

He watches as the screen to his right lights up with blue-outlined diagrams. "Oh," he mutters, and tugs on the blue wire. It comes away easily.

"Sir, if I may, you don't seem very focused this morning."

"Don't, Jarvis." Tony mutters, twisting the wire in his fingers around a light green one and pushing it into a back socket. Pepper's long legs in stilettos run briefly through his mind and he wonders where that thought came from.

**Zzzzt****!**

"AGH!!" Tony pulls back, and pale smoke fluffs from the suit. "Don't start," he mutters, more to himself than to Jarvis, "I give up for now."

He wipes his hands on his jeans and decides to throw on a nice shirt for Rhodey and his mystery guest.

-

Colonel James Rhodes is waiting for Anthony Stark.

For about the 5,463rd time in his life—and he's not surprised. He's sitting on a wooden bench on the bright lawn of Stark Industries, sweaty Malibu sun dripping down on him. A sleek silver Audi pulls up at the speed of light, stopping on a dime. Rhodes squints in the bright light.

"How is it that you never get a ticket?"

Tony smirks at his friend, "Too many female traffic cops in these here parts."

"Oh, really, Tony. Really?"

"No, I actually drive at exactly five miles above the speed limit. I'm a safe driver, Rhodey."

"Sure you are."

"I am!"

Rhodes glances sideways at his friend as they walk into the building, "Tell that to the hole in your ceiling."

"That had nothing to do with driving! It was parking. What can I say, I was raised on valets." Tony winks and Rhodes rolls his eyes.

"Well," Rhodes begins as they enter one of the conference rooms, "I don't have a lot of time. And I know you're 'not manufacturing weapons anymore,'—"

"Did you just make air-quotes? Air-quotes, Jim?"

"Focus, Tony, _focus_! Stark Industries is still actively involved in U.S. military defense equipment and technology development, so I—"

"Are you explaining to me what my company does? Because I know what my company does."

"Tony, would you just listen? I'm sticking to the cards because I've got an appointment in ten minutes, okay? Okay. Where was I—oh, well the point is we've been losing contact with a lot of U.S. defense technology in the East Pacific. Do you know anything about this?"

"Why would I know anything about that? That sounds like terrorist—oh."

"Well, I was just wondering if you could—I mean, it would save a lot of—"

"Yeah, I see how it is. You're just using me for my suit. I thought we were more than that, Colonel!"

"Tony."

"Yeah, I can check it out. Is this vitally important? Is this why you called a meeting?"

"It's not vitally important, no. And it's not why I called a meeting. This isn't even really a meeting, is it." Rhodes glances at Tony, who is sitting on the conference table. "I'm no longer going to be chief liaison to Stark Industries, so I wanted to introduce you to the guy who is."

Rhodes nods at the door and a tall, blonde man steps in.

"How did you do that?" Tony mutters as he cranes his neck around to look at this intruder, "This is my building, isn't it? How do you just get large military men to lurk about and come into rooms at your beck and call?"

Rhodes rolls his eyes. Tony hops off the conference table and sizes up the stranger, "Anthony Stark, CEO of Stark Industries." He sticks out his hand and the stranger takes it.

"Steve Rogers. It's an honor, sir."

--

Hi guys!

Thanks for the awesome reviews, to answer all of you…obviously, I am planning on continuing this. In fact, it's a big, fun, super exciting adventure! But yeah, I was looking at fanfiction and searching for instant gratification (i.e. Tony/Pepper action) and so that's why I decided to begin it as such (re: the first chapter). Don't worry, there will be lots of Tony/Pepper, but now I have to set up the story a little. And Quicksilvermad—I would be so flattered if you drew scenes!

-lil jake


	3. Chapter 3

Pepper can't concentrate.

She can't even concentrate on what's distracting her. Half her brain is remembering last night. The other half is preoccupied with _just_ how wrong that is.

Half of her remembers, all too vividly, the feel of his hands drawing lightly up her spine, the feel of his lips gently against hers, the feel of the arc reactor depressing an indent into her chest. This, of course, only leads to some (she is loathe to admit, rather regular) visions of Tony naked—all hard muscle and male sweat—above her, pressing down on her, his mouth over her collar bone and his hands on her thighs.

The other half is mostly annoyed at how _easy_ Tony thinks this is. Not that he's voiced his opinion, in so many words, of course, but she knows how easy he thinks it is. Make coffee. Check. Bed his assistant. Check. Meet with the board at noon. Check.

It's not even that she's necessarily in love with him (it's not even that she'll admit she's in love with him); it's that it just _isn't_ that easy. All profound revelations aside, she figures, it just looks unprofessional for both of them.

But his hands, and his lips, and his dark, dark eyes…

Movement sounds downstairs, alerting her to Tony's renewed presence.

There are the quick thumps of footsteps up the carpeted stairs, and Tony pokes his head into the guest bedroom that she's claimed as her personal office. She looks up, one perfect eyebrow arching.

Tony smiles at her, sitting there at her desk, shoes kicked off and laptop open.

"Hey." His smile is disarming.

"Hey, yourself." Pepper closes her laptop and looks at him expectantly, "How was the meeting?"

"Meeting?" Tony cocks his head and leans against the doorframe, "Oh, yeah. Eh. Rhodey's stepping down as liaison to the company. Didn't give a reason. Met the new guy. Big, typical military."

"Oh?" Pepper reopens her laptop, "What's his name, I'll throw him on the contact list."

"Uh, Stan. Or Steve. Steve-something." Tony doesn't care. "I'll have Jim forward you the stuff."

Pepper rolls her eyes. "Anything else? Because I just scheduled a meeting with the board in an hour."

Tony nods, "I'm flying to Japan."

"After the meeting."

Tony scratches the back of his neck and tries to look helpless. "It's…kinda urgent."

"Urgent."

"Absolutely." He nods to emphasize said urgency.

"So urgent that it cannot wait until after the meeting."

"Uh-huh." He crosses to where she's sitting and leans against her desk.

She falters. He's suddenly way, way too close, and she can smell his cologne and she has to look up to see his face. He shifts, pulls his coat off and tosses it across the room onto the bed. She focuses on the light blue stripes of his shirt, and continues. "Mr. Stark, you've been avoiding the board for over two weeks and I really think they need at least an, um, an appearance."

"They'll get over it. This is more important. This is all that's important."

"Japan? The Japanese don't have any of your weapons that weren't supplied to them directly by the U.S. military, Tony."

"Not Japan, necessarily. But someone does. My technology. It's complicated, and there are military secrets involved…I can't really tell you everything." Tony frowns, and Pepper frowns.

"What are you talking about?"

"I don't know. But I'm about to find out." He reaches down and puts his hand over hers, where it is resting on the desk, and pauses before thinking better of it. "I'll be back sometime tomorrow morning."

With that, he turns and walks out of the room.

-

A half-hour later, Pepper still sits in her "office", trying to get work done.

"Jarvis?"

"Yes, Miss Potts?" The silky voice of the A.I. responds immediately.

"Is Tony still here?"

"He's in the middle of suiting up right now."

Pepper slips her heels on and starts toward the door.

"Thank you, Jarvis," She calls over her shoulder.

"Anytime, Miss Potts."

-

Tony's both glad and annoyed that he's streamlined the suit process. Glad, because it means he doesn't have to spend over 24 hours in it. Annoyed, because it's a lot easier to put on a ton of metal when robots are helping you.

He snaps down his left gauntlet and catches his finger in the process. "Shit!" He yells, just as Pepper walks through the door.

"It's okay," he mutters as he hears her heels clicking faster toward him, "Just a scratch."

Her heel-clicks slow.

"Come to wish me luck?" He mutters, as he fiddles with the gauntlet.

"No." She replies. "Just good-bye."

He glances up, "That's not very supportive."

She stares at him, her blue eyes steel. He walks over and holds out his hand, where he is bleeding slightly from the gauntlet bite, and adopts a pout. "I won't be gone very long, it's not even a fighting kind of mission."

Pepper picks up a tube of antibiotic ointment from the work desk behind her and yanks the cap off. "If it's not a fighting mission, _Mr. Stark_, then why don't you just take a plane?" She rubs the ointment on the cut and then releases his hand.

"Faster. And, you know, you never know." Tony shrugs.

"I don't believe you." Pepper mutters. _How dare you risk your life when you don't need to,_ is what she thinks.

Tony looks up, hears the bite in her tone. He's getting tired of this. His eyes darken, and his mouth sets. "Fine." He says, "Don't wait up." He snaps the other gauntlet on, and picks up the helmet.

Pepper doesn't say anything, because he looks so set and so ready for some stupid battle that she's afraid she might cry if she tries. He steps closer to her, the helmet at his side, until he's so close she can't breathe.

"Wish me luck." He leans down and presses his lips against hers, fiercely.

He steps back, puts on his helmet, and without a word he's zipping past his car collection and out the hole in the ceiling.

She slowly raises her hand to her lips, and steadies herself on his work table.

_Good luck._

-

A/N: I know, I'm a bad person. I don't have any excuses. Well, I do, but you don't want to hear them. Congratulations to tamasit1 who made me feel guilty.


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